Programmed for Peril

lust rose like possession. His red stubbly hair was plastered with sweat, stars, and blood from the half dozen gouges on his scalp. His eyes bugged. Cords in his neck stood out like rails. With strength that seemed impossible after such a long struggle he snatched up a heavy computer, connectors snaking from its rear. He brought it crashing down on his brother’s head. He raised it again, smashed it down on the defenseless skull. He made a bestial sound in his throat, “Grnnnk, grnnnk, grnnnk ..."
    He left the computer covering his still brother’s face. When he turned toward Trish he was panting from a gaping mouth. Two of his front teeth had been knocked out. The others protruded like fangs. A red worm of blood crawled amid stars from the edge of his mouth.
    “Devil!” Trish shouted. She jerked the pistol from her purse, aimed at his middle, and fired. The report in the small room sounded loud as the crack of doom. He spun around and toppled down on his back. He wasn’t dead because his arms were moving.
    Trish scarcely heard Melody’s screams. She moved cautiously to fallen Carson, pistol gripped before her outstretched arms. She saw she had shot him in the abdomen. His hand was twitching on his chest. Despite all rationality to the contrary, she felt sorry for him—and fear for herself. She knew that pity could destroy as well as hate. His breath came in a ragged rush. The fingers of his right hand were nudging weakly at the yellow note he had written earlier.
    What about the note? She had already read it. Never wholly free of fear of the diabolical Carson, she snatched at the yellow sheet, dreading even the familiar. As she did she looked at his face.
    Despite the blood and damage there was no mistaking his fanged smile.
    She put the pistol atop a smashed monitor and spread the sheet.
    Her eyes fell on the familiar message. So? She turned the sheet over. On the its back now was a second message in Carson’s hand.
    My defense against the possibility of treachery: Champ fed Melody an explosive capsule. A remote timer controls it. It goes bang at five, or if she moves out of range. I’ll trade the timer’s location for my freedom, or a tune.
    Trish’s eyes found her watch. Ten minutes to five.
    She froze with the paper in her hand. A rush of memory carried her back to the three dead doctors’ daughters. Their innards were torn open, the police reported. She had assumed that meant with the help of some sharp edge. Now it dawned on her with certainty that crazy Carson had created deadly devices that blew the children’s abdomens open. He ordered Champ to use them. Now he had selected that means to execute the child that he had been outraged to find was not his daughter.
    Oh, no! Oh, no! She couldn’t bear that in the end Carson would win. He was the devil!
    She had to bring him back to consciousness! She would put the pistol to his head. She would demand he tell her where the timer was or she would kill him. Not even Carson could want to die. No matter how much he hated her and Melody. She rushed on rubbery legs to the squalid bathroom. She filled a flimsy plastic bucket with water and dashed it onto Carson’s face.
    He didn’t stir.
    She felt his chest. He was alive. She had wounded him badly. She shook him. “Wake up! Wake up!” He didn’t move.
    “Mommy, I want to go! I want to leave. Please!”
    She turned toward Melody. “Did you eat a Sno-Ball when you first came here?” She held her breath.
    “The man that pretended he was Carson gave me one.”
    “Did you—gulp it down, the way I told you not to do?”
    “Mommy, I was hungry!”
    Trish said softly, “My dear baby.” She hugged the girl for a long moment.
    She hurried for another bucket of water, poured it on Carson. Still he didn’t move. She knew he was dying. Somewhere in this smelly nest a tiny electronic chip was measuring out the last minutes of her daughter’s life. She cursed Carson wordlessly. From between the doorway of life and death he was going to destroy her most precious possession.
    She glanced at her watch. Eight minutes to five.
    She held Melody’s head gently between her palms. “Mel, listen. There was something bad in that Sno-Ball that man gave you.” Her daughter’s face was pallid. Her lower lip trembled. Fresh tears welled down her already tracked checks. What she had been forced to witness!
    And the trouble was far from over.
    “I’m going to try to make you vomit.”
    “I don’t want